BIG TROUBLE WITH PRICKLED CHINA : Trump Camp Scrambles To Play Down Taiwan Call After Beijing Lodges Complaint... Pence: ‘Tempest In A Teapot’... ‘Media-Driven’... Conway: ‘Just A Phone Call’... Campaign Has Not Reached Out To China... Trump Organization Denies Reports Of Taiwan Hotel Development... ‘China Will Regard This As A Deeply Destabilizing Event’

President-elect Donald Trump’s team insists it’s not a big deal that he spoke directly with Taiwan’s president, breaking with years of delicate foreign policy precedent and leading to the Chinese government lodging a complaint over the matter with the U.S. 

Vice President-elect Mike Pence said Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that the Trump campaign had “not to [his] knowledge” reached out to China following the outcry. He told host Chuck Todd that he “wouldn’t expect” a call this week, either.

“To be honest with you, the waters here seem like a little bit of a tempest in a teapot,” Pence said, arguing the media had stirred up any controversy.

“I think most Americans and frankly most leaders around the world know this for what it was,” he said. “And it’s all part and parcel. I think you’re going to see in a President Donald Trump a willingness to engage the world but engage the world on America’s terms.”

On Friday, Trump tweeted that he had spoken to the “president of Taiwan,” who had called “to wish me congratulations on winning the Presidency.” Pence and Trump adviser Kellyanne Conway both said Sunday that the call came from Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen. 

But what may sound like just a phone call was a split with longstanding U.S. policymeant to protect relations with China, which considers Taiwan part of its country. The U.S. government recognized China’s claim in 1979, and does not have formal diplomatic relations with Taiwan as part of a “one China policy.” For this reason, a U.S. president or president-elect has not, at least as known to the public, spoken with a leader of Taiwan in more than 35 years. more